


Get What You Need

by strengefruit



Category: Doctor Who, Torchwood
Genre: M/M, Not really a fix-it fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-22
Updated: 2015-12-22
Packaged: 2018-05-08 08:33:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,722
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5490650
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/strengefruit/pseuds/strengefruit
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After waiting for over a year for more Torchwood, Children of Earth was far from what I was hoping for. So I don't really think of this as a CoE fic, but something that could happen with or without it. Mostly it was just something I wanted to write.</p>
<p>In my mind, it's set really quite far in Jack's future. Inspiration came from certain scenes from CoE and certain characters from Doctor Who. But I don't want to say more than that. Just read and see?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Get What You Need

“Don’t wait up,” Jack called over his shoulder as he closed the blue wooden door behind him. He’d been to the planet a couple of times before – if one went by a linear timeline it was about one hundred years ago and fifty years in the future – so he knew that where he wanted to go would be there. But that still left a rather large margin of error and it took him a while to find his way through the narrow streets filled with unfamiliar landmarks.

Eventually he reached a brightly lit entrance he recognized and slipped through the curtained doorway. The décor was different than he remembered, everything was sharp edges of blue and orange, but he was certain the menu would be unchanged. Travelling was all well and good, but he needed a bit of shore leave and wouldn’t let some visible grey slow him down.

A young human girl sitting at reception smiled when he reached the desk and asked for his name.

“Captain Jack Harkness,” he replied, flashing a grin and causing her to blush furiously as she typed his name into the computer. Grey hair definitely wasn’t a problem.

A sudden beep from the computer cut off his train of thought.

“I have a pre-paid reservation for a Jack Harkness,” she told him, “If you’ll just follow the hallway on the left to Room 104.”

Jack stared at her for a half a second before coming to his senses. “Excuse me?”

“Room 104 to the left,” she said again, a bit slower.

“But I didn’t make a reservation,” he protested.

“Are you Jack Harkness,” she asked him, reading off the screen, “a resident of ‘TARDIS’?”

His long life as a conman kept his shock from showing. “Yes, that’s me.”

“Then you have a reservation,” she said matter-of-factly.

“I can’t believe I forgot,” Jack apologized, which of course was a lie. He gave her a smile he knew had the appropriate dose of embarrassment, then turned and headed down the hallway to whatever was in Room 104. Being immortal he had learned a few things over the years, one of which was to never fear for his own personal safety. Another was to never look a gift whore in the mouth.

Room 104 had a bright copper door that slid open when he touched it, revealing a dark young man wearing that era’s idea of a black suit and sitting rather stiffly on the edge of a large canopy bed. As soon as he saw Jack in the doorway he jumped to his feet.

Jack went right to business. “Who are you, and what’s going on?” he demanded. The young man seemed to take it all in stride, extending a hand for Jack to shake. Jack pointedly crossed his arms.

“My name is Harris,” he said, withdrawing his hand without skipping a beat. “I was sent on behalf of my employer to...”

“How do you know about the TARDIS?” Jack asked, cutting him off. “If you’re here to kill me can we just get it over with?”

“Don’t worry Mr. Harkness, my employer is not interested in hurting you. Besides,” Harris smiled, “we both know that killing you is not really an option.” Jack opened his mouth to interject, but Harris raised a hand to stop him before continuing on. “As for my employer, you could say that he’s a friend of that Doctor you’re travelling with.”

Warning bells were ringing in Jack’s mind. “And who exactly _is_ your employer?” he asked.

“He would rather introduce himself in person, if that’s alright with you,” Harris replied. “Now if you’ll come with me?” Without giving Jack a chance to respond he slipped past him and started walking back down the hall towards the exit. Deciding the best thing to do was just go along with it, Jack turned and followed, inwardly sighing over the sudden change of plans. But another thing he had learned in his long life was that you really can’t always get what you want.

The receptionist looked surprised to see Jack again so soon, but didn’t say anything as he left on Harris’ heels. Once outside, Harris went in the opposite direction from which Jack had come, leading him down unfamiliar streets to god knows where.

“My employer would have come to meet you in person, you see, but he didn’t think it would be best to be found in such an establishment,” Harris explained as they walked.

“I’ve never seen a problem with it,” Jack said curtly.

“Ah, but you’re still young,” he told Jack, who didn’t bother to correct him Instead, Jack let the conversation lapse into silence which didn’t last long. Only a minute later that they arrived at a very posh hotel – an immense glass structure taking up an entire city block and stretching up six times as high. Harris stopped outside as the doors opened before him.

“After you, sir,” he said, waiting for Jack to go in ahead of him. Blue and orange must be in fashion, Jack thought as he entered the massive lobby, for it was decorated in the same colours as the place he just left but on a far grander scale. Five different receptionists came forward to greet him in five different languages, none of them human and none of them English, but they all quickly retreated when Harris entered behind him and waved them off.

“We’re almost there,” Harris assured Jack as he resumed his position in the lead. They walked down a carpeted pathway of Turkish blue that cut straight through the lobby and ended at a row of elevators. The doors of the middle-most elevator opened and again Harris stopped.

“This is where we must part our ways,” he said, “If you could kindly take the elevator up to the forty-second floor my employer is waiting for you.”

“And you won’t tell me who he is?” Jack tried asking one last time.

Of course, Harris just kept smiling. “Not when you’re so close.”

Curiosity now overwhelming caution, Jack stepped into the elevator and pressed the small button labelled “42.” The doors closed silently and within seconds they opened again, revealing a much smaller lobby, this time decorated in softer shades of brown. Jack thought he could even see a touch of old Earth styles in there. At the opposite side of the room was a set of large wooden doors, beside which stood a pale woman wearing a suit exactly like that which Harris had on.

“Welcome, Mr. Harkness,” she said, “I hope you had no trouble getting here?”

“I’m still not quite sure where here is,” he retorted.

She nodded knowingly. “You’ll have to forgive Harris. He’s new to the job and still has a bit of a flair for the dramatic.”

“I noticed,” Jack grinned. Immortality had also taught him that when faced with the unknown, sometimes it was wise just to turn on the charm and hope for the best. The sudden flush of pink in her cheeks showed him he wasn’t wrong.

“Well,” she cleared her throat, “you mustn’t keep him waiting.” The wooden doors were as old-fashioned as much of the décor, so instead of waiting for it to open automatically she pulled one open for Jack and gestured for him to go inside.

The large room on the other side was nearly empty save for a glass tank almost as tall as an average person, positioned beside a window that gave a beautiful view of the city below. Inside the tank a massive head floating in a haze of smoke turned away from the window to look at Jack as he entered the room.

“So you’re the mysterious employer,” Jack said, relaxing his guard.

“ _I’m glad you could finally make it_ ,” echoed the voice of the Face of Boe in Jack’s mind. “ _I’ve waited a very long time to meet you_.”

“But how did you know I’d be here?” Jack asked as he crossed the room, closing the distance between them.

“ _Because_ you _knew_.”

No number of years as a conman could hide Jack’s surprise. “What do you mean?”

“ _You as well as anyone know how timelines can be_ ,” said the Face of Boe.

“Which means...”

“ _Yes_ ,” the Face of Boe explained, “ _because you’re here right now in the future you’ll remember where you were. I brought you here today to pass along a message from yourself_.”

He looked solemnly down at the Face of Boe and sighed. “I take it the world’s ending again,” he said more than asked.

“ _The world’s always ending_.”

Something about the way he said that caught at Jack’s memory, and he crouched down to look directly into the Face of Boe.

“What is the message?”

There was a hint of sadness in the Face of Boe’s eyes. “ _Simply, ‘I remember’_.”

Memories of last days spent together from so long ago that had started to surface now rushed forward, forcing Jack to blink back tears that wanted to fight their way out.

“How long?” he managed to ask. “How long do I remember him?”

“ _Always_.”

Jack took a moment to just let that word and what it meant sink in.

“Is that all there was?” he eventually asked.

“ _That’s all I can tell you_ ,” the Face of Boe replied regrettably.

Jack stood up and looked out over the city. “I should probably leave then,” he said. “Timelines and all that. Don’t want to find out too much.”

“ _It would be for the best_ ,” he agreed.

“Thank you,” Jack said, not knowing what else to say, then turned and walked from the room.

Neither the woman nor Harris tried to stop Jack as he left the hotel, a fact for which he was very grateful. He wasn’t quite sure where to go, because the TARDIS wasn’t an option and he definitely wasn’t in the mood to carry out his original plan. So instead Jack found an alley that the light from the streets couldn’t reach and sank to the ground, his back against a smooth alien wall. He didn’t cry; the sorrow that had cut through him was slowly fading away, and in its place he found relief. He’d kept his promise.

“I never could forget you,” he said, to a man long dead.

Long dead but loved for all eternity.


End file.
